Raging Bolt ex

Intro + Notable Placings

• 3rd at World Championships 2025

• 1st at World Championships 2025, Junior Division

• 15th at Regional Frankfurt

• 14th at Regional Monterrey

• 18th at Regional Pittsburgh

• 4th, 5th at Malaysia Premier Ball League

Raging Bolt ex is the other aggro deck in the format, this time relying solely on Basic attackers. When F Regulation Mark was still legal, the deck relied on PokéStop for setup, but switched to Fan Rotom and Noctowl after it rotated. Losing PokéStop also meant losing Pokémon Catcher, and the deck switched to the non-ex Raging Bolt to snipe evolving Basics/Stage 1s on the Bench instead. Among the top tiers, Raging Bolt ex is unfavored against Gardevoir ex, but the inclusion of non-ex Raging Bolt means you still have a chance if you can snipe the Ralts/Kirlia before they evolve into Gardevoir ex.

Most decks have the means to beat Raging Bolt ex — it's Iono. If the Bolt player spends all their on-board Energy on a KO and goes down to 2 Prizes, getting Iono-ed and whiffing on Professor Sada's Vitality or Noctowl often means skipping one attack, which gives the other player an opportunity to catch up.

Game Plan

On turn 1, you'll want to get both Fan Rotom and Teal Mask Ogerpon ex into play. Use Fan Rotom to search for Ditto, Hoothoot, and/or Noctowl, and have the Ogerpon ready to turn on Noctowl's Jewel Seeker next turn. If you play Squawkabilly ex, you can use Nest/Ultra Ball to search for it and give yourself a fresh hand of 6 to try to hit any missing pieces.

You want to be taking Prizes starting from your second turn. Look at what targets your opponent presents and use Noctowl to find the right pieces for the KO:

• If they have a Benched Basic/Stage 1 with 90 HP or less, you can snipe it by getting 3 Energy onto (non-ex) Raging Bolt or Fezandipiti ex. To accomplish this, you'll need to have attached an Energy on T1 and not discarded it to retreat, or have found Teal Mask Ogerpon ex + any Energy on T2. Your Noctowl search targets will be Crispin + Energy Switch (making sure you have Lightning + Fighting if you're attacking with Bolt, or Lightning + Fighting + Grass if you're using Ogerpon to accelerate). Use Crispin to attach one Energy to Bolt/Fez, use Teal Dance to accelerate a Grass Energy if necessary, attach another Energy manually to Bolt/Fez, then Energy Switch the Energy from your T1 attachment or T2 Teal Dance onto Bolt/Fez.

• If they have a Benched Basic with 70 HP or less, you can Boss it out and KO it with Fan Rotom. You'll need Boss's Orders/Prime Catcher + Area Zero Underdepths (remember, Fan Rotom needs a Stadium) + Earthen Vessel/any Energy for the KO — this is a 3-card combo, so you'll need to have drawn into at least one of the pieces naturally, and use Noctowl to search out the missing ones.

• If they have a Benched ex with 210 HP or less, you can KO it with Raging Bolt ex. Your Noctowl search targets will be Crispin + Prime Catcher + Earthen Vessel/any Energy. You'll want to search for Lightning + Fighting + Grass between Crispin and Earthen Vessel (and usually a second Grass for another Teal Dance next turn), attach Fighting + Lightning to Bolt with Crispin + manual attachment, Teal Dance a Grass onto Ogerpon, and finally use Prime Catcher to drag out the target and KO it with Bellowing Thunder. Note that Prime Catcher switches your Active too, so Raging Bolt ex should be on the Bench before you play it. If not, Latias ex can bring it back in for free.

When your board is fully developed (which I would define as having at least 1 Teal Mask Ogerpon ex, 1 Hoothoot, and 2 Ancient attackers), switch to assembling the 3-card combo of Earthen Vessel + Ultra Ball + Professor Sada's Vitality to charge your Ancient Pokémon up for bigger attacks. Use Sada liberally; even if you still have Crispin available to accelerate Energy, it's usually better to Sada instead, as the 3-card draw will help you avoid bricking next turn. Noctowl can be used to find any missing pieces, and you can get Noctowl off Ultra Ball to keep the chain going into the next turn if you have another Hoothoot down. If you only have 1 Ancient Pokémon, get one more with the Ultra Ball and worry about finding Noctowl later.

After you've powered up and attacked with Raging Bolt ex once, you can do so again next turn with Earthen Vessel/Energy Retrieval + Professor Sada's Vitality — this is almost the same combo as before, but because you now have Energy in your discard pile from Bolt's attack, you do not need Ultra Ball, and can use Energy Retrieval instead of Earthen Vessel. Sada attaches 2 Energy for free, Vessel/Retrieval gets one Grass Energy for Teal Dance, and the final Energy can be manually attached. That's 280 damage right there, from a board that was Energy-less at the start of the turn. If you have a leftover Energy from the previous turn, or a second Teal Mask Ogerpon ex + Grass Energy, you can hit 350.

An alternative way to take 2 Prizes the turn after you attack with Raging Bolt ex is to hunt down Fezandipiti ex with Koraidon or Slither Wing. On the turn you attack with Bolt, choose Koraidon or Slither Wing as the other recipient of Sada's Energy acceleration. Then, if they put Fezandipiti ex down, use Earthen Vessel/Energy Retrieval/Night Stretcher + Boss's Orders/Prime Catcher to get the second Energy on Koraidon/Slither Wing and pull Fez out for the KO.

Attackers

This deck has a surprising number of support Pokémon that can turn into attackers.

Your first possible attacker is Fan Rotom. Assault Landing does 70 damage for 1 Energy (and a Stadium in play), which is enough to KO Babies and evolving Basics. 

Your next possible attacker is (non-ex) Raging Bolt. With 3 Energy attached, it can snipe for 90 damage, enough to KO most evolving Stage 1s. It can also do 130 damage to the Active, if they leave a Munkidori there for example. Fezandipiti ex can also snipe for 3 Energy (and does 10 more damage, in fact), but it's a 2-Prizer, and isn't a valid target for Professor Sada's Vitality if you end up having to use that over Crispin.

These two 1-Prize attackers are usually needed to take early Prizes and disrupt the opponent, unless they're playing a deck that lets you go 2-2-2 immediately. Discarding Energy with Raging Bolt ex to KO 1-Prizers is wasteful and may leave you without enough Energy late-game.

When you need to hit larger damage numbers, that's when Raging Bolt ex comes in. Discarding 5 Energy total is enough to KO most things, and against Basic/Stage 1 ex's you might only need 4, or even 3 if they're non-attacking support Pokémon. Professor Sada's Vitality is crucial for keeping these expensive attacks going.

Teal Mask Ogerpon ex can attack against Grass-weak decks (Charizard ex, Marnie's Grimmsnarl ex, N's Zoroark ex). These Grass-weak Pokémon attack for 2 Energy, and Ogerpon attacks for 3, so Myriad Leaf Shower will do 180*2 = 360 damage after Weakness, for a 1HKO. 

First or Second?

This deck wants to go first, as it's a Noctowl deck.

While the deck's attackers are all Basic Pokémon (which might seem like an argument for going second), they are quite Energy-hungry, so you usually aren't able to convert a going-second start into a T1 Prize card. You're better off going first.

ACE SPEC

Prime Catcher. This deck can hit high damage numbers pretty easily; Prime Catcher complements this by letting you choose what you KO. You often spend your Supporter for the turn on Professor Sada's Vitality, so it's handy to have a non-Supporter gust.

Other Options

• Squawkabilly ex, Mew ex: Draw Abilities. Squawkabilly ex is only good on turn 1, but Ultra Balling for it is a freeroll, since you're discarding your hand anyway. Mew ex helps replenish your hand if you get hit by Iono late-game.

• Slither Wing PAR, Koraidon SSP: Additional 1-Prize attackers. They can 1HKO Fighting-weak Pokémon like Fezandipiti ex or Bloodmoon Ursaluna ex. Slither Wing 1HKOs Pikachu ex through Resolute Heart with Burn (and to add insult to injury, Burn KOs don't let the opponent Flip the Script). Koraidon is better at beating Crustle, and its attack is less color-intensive.

• Chien-Pao + 3rd Area Zero Underdepths: If you fill your Bench to 7 while Area Zero Underdepths is in play, you can play Chien-Pao and use its Ability to discard AZU (and with it, any Benched liabilities), then immediately put down another AZU.

• Judge: Alternative to Iono.

• Professor Turo's Scenario: Lets you escape retreat locks, or replay Noctowl.

• Glass Trumpet: Attaches 2 Energy from the discard to your Fan Rotoms or Noctowls as Bellowing Thunder fodder. Energy Retrieval is mostly better, as getting back 2 Grass Energy with 2 Teal Mask Ogerpon ex's out means you'll still end up with 2 attachments, but also draw 2 cards on top of that. Glass Trumpet dodges Toedscruel, though, and it can also power up Terapagos ex or Bloodmoon Ursaluna ex if you play those.

• Jamming Tower: 3rd Stadium. This deck doesn't use any Pokémon Tools, so it can disrupt the opponent with no negative effects on yourself.

• 6th Grass Energy: Some builds play this over Energy Retrieval. It's better early-game and in heavy Crispin builds.

Tips

• If you're missing both Teal Mask Ogerpon ex and Ancient attackers in your starting hand, it's better to use your Ball searches to find Ogerpon first, since it will turn on Noctowl, which can then search for Nest Ball to find an Ancient. If you used the Ball search on an Ancient first, you'd be stuck with a dead Noctowl in hand.

• If you play Squawkabilly ex, remember to Squawk and Seize before Fan Calling if you have access to both on your first turn.

• If you're attacking with Fan Rotom, try to use Lightning or Fighting Energy for its attack. Grass Energy is better saved in hand for Teal Dance, and if Fan Rotom gets KOed or needs to retreat without Latias ex, the discarded Energy can be Sada-ed onto your other attackers with Lightning/Fighting in their attack costs.

• Sometimes you need to NOT play Latias ex (or bump AZU and discard it from your Bench) so you can spend Energy on retreats and Sada that Energy back to better recipients. Example: you have a Fan Rotom with Lightning Energy attached in the Active Spot, a Raging Bolt ex Benched, Fighting Energy and Professor Sada's Vitality in hand (both playable this turn), but no Lightning Energy in the discard. To get {L}{F} on Raging Bolt ex for Bellowing Thunder, you'll want to discard the Lightning Energy to pay for Fan Rotom's retreat (which you can only do without Latias ex on the board), Sada it onto Raging Bolt ex, then manually attach Fighting Energy from hand.

• When you attack with Bellowing Thunder, try to leave any remaining Energy evenly distributed on the board after discarding. This lets you avoid blowouts from them Bossing your guy with 2 Energy and KOing it, leaving you with insufficient Energy for the next attack. If they can't KO your Active Raging Bolt ex on their turn, leave 1 Energy on it so Sada can power it up next turn without manual attachments. If you know they have no choice but to take a KO on your Active Raging Bolt ex on their turn, discard all Energy from it, and leave 1 Energy on the next attacker.

• If you're leaving 1 Energy on Raging Bolt ex, leave Lightning if you have more copies of Fighting in your Prizes/deck and vice versa. That way, if you topdeck the complementary Energy, you can have Raging Bolt ex charged without committing to Professor Sada's Vitality, and have the option of using a different Supporter. Identifying Prized Energy is quite valuable as you have substantial odds of taking them off KOs (if 1 out of your 6 remaining Prizes is an Energy and you KO a 2-Prizer, you have a 33% chance of getting it); if you didn't do so during the first deck search of the game, you can Prize check during any search effect on the KO turn, i.e. Noctowl, Earthen Vessel, or Nest/Ultra Ball.

• In matchups where Teal Mask Ogerpon ex is an attacker, leaving 1 Grass Energy on it is sufficient to threaten a swing as long as you still have Earthen Vessel or Energy Retrieval with enough Grass Energy in the deck/discard pile. Teal Dance one Grass Energy, manually attach the other, and you're ready to attack.

• If you play Koraidon, remember the condition for Unrelenting Assault's bonus damage. If Koraidon attacked last turn and got KOed, but you Night Stretcher it back and manage to attach 2 Energy onto it, you can Unrelenting Assault again for the full 180 damage, as it's considered a new Pokémon. If your Raging Bolt ex is getting walled by Crustle, you can Bellowing Thunder for 0 just to meet Unrelenting Assault's condition.

• Slither Wing has a milling attack. If all hope seems lost, send it up, Stomp Off, and hope for the best — you might just hit the last copy of a card that your opponent needed for the win and steal the game that way.